State GOP lawmakers propose bills to counter prison realignment

March 19, 2013

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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Brandy Arreola, seated, who was permanently injured last year by her boyfriend, a parole violator who had been released early form jail because over overcrowding, holds her head in her hands as her mother, Diana Munoz, discusses the attack during a news conference at the Capitol in Sacramento on Tuesday. Munoz is supporting Republican lawmakers who announced a legislative package to address problems they say have resulted from Gov. Jerry Brown's prison realignment plan, which sends inmates convected of lower-level crimes to county jails instead of state prisons. RICH PEDRONCELLI, AP

Brandy Arreola, seated, who was permanently injured last year by her boyfriend, a parole violator who had been released early form jail because over overcrowding, holds her head in her hands as her mother, Diana Munoz, discusses the attack during a news conference at the Capitol in Sacramento on Tuesday. Munoz is supporting Republican lawmakers who announced a legislative package to address problems they say have resulted from Gov. Jerry Brown's prison realignment plan, which sends inmates convected of lower-level crimes to county jails instead of state prisons. RICH PEDRONCELLI, AP

SACRAMENTO – Republican lawmakers proposed a package of bills Tuesday intended to counter what they see as a growing threat to public safety from sending some inmates to county jails instead of state prisons.

The 13 bills seek to counter the effects of prison realignment in 2011 by improving supervision of parolees and increase penalties for sex offenders and those who illegally possess or sell firearms.

The measures also would send more convicts back to prison to ease the burden on local jails while protecting counties from lawsuits.

"Republicans recognize that we must close the worst realignment loopholes," said Assembly Minority Leader Connie Conway, R-Tulare.

The bills' chances are uncertain in a Legislature controlled by Democrats.

The measures were proposed nearly 18 months after Gov. Jerry Brown's prison realignment took effect, sending inmates convicted of lower-level crimes to county jails instead of state prisons.

Brown's office declined to comment on the measures proposed Tuesday.

Jeffrey Callison, a spokesman for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said the bills would increase problems in state prisons that are now under federal court order to improve conditions.

A related bill was rejected last week on a party-line vote in the Assembly Public Safety Committee. The bill, AB2 by Assemblyman Mike Morrell, R-Rancho Cucamonga, would have sent paroled sex offenders back to state prisons, instead of county jails, if they fail to register as sex offenders.

The proposals have the backing of Diana Munoz, mother of Brandy Arreola, 21, of Stockton, who was permanently injured last year by her boyfriend, Raoul Leyva, a parole violator who had been released early from jail because of overcrowding.

Leyva, 34, was convicted last month of attempted voluntary manslaughter and injuring a spouse, with enhancements for causing brain injury and paralysis.

"If realignment didn't exist ... my daughter would be living her life normally," Munoz said as her daughter sat in a wheelchair by her side. "The state is responsible for what's happened to her. They should never have let him out."

Other bills in the Republican package would impose prison instead of jail time for criminals who remove their GPS-linked tracking devices; send all sex offenders who violate their parole back to prison, and have state parole agents, rather than county probation agencies, supervise all released sex offenders.

The proposals come amid rising concerns over the consequences of Brown's realignment law that took effect in October 2011.

The number of paroled sex offenders who are fugitives in California is 15 percent higher today than before realignment; counties are housing more than 1,100 inmates serving sentences of five years or more in jails designed for stays of a year or less; and inmate advocacy groups are beginning to sue counties over the same type of poor housing and treatment conditions that led to years of litigation and billions in additional costs for the state.

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